October 2011

12/07/2010

An offline Twitter chat shared

This might win the prize for laziest blog
I’ve ever written. Are there prizes for that? I’m getting one if there are.

I got almost shockingly great feedback to my
Twitter and my drug habit post this week (THANK you to anyone who took the time) and at a similar time I got some great feedback from
a friend on a brain dump of an email that I’d done for her on how to get
started on Twitter. I thought I might just share the email straight, on the off
chance that it’s as useful to anyone else as it was to her.

Read on knowing the following things:

1. 1. This is, to all intents and
purposes, the exact email I sent – I’ve pretty much fixed one typo, pulled out names and added some hyperlinks, in case you get bored*

2. 2. It’s very colloquial - it is NOT a
professional thought piece. It is an on the fly, series of words written at circa
2am to catch my friend before she flew out to a project in the field. You'll get a tiny bit of overlap if you read the druggy blog, too

3. 3. It was written for someone with
little to no Twitter experience

4. 4. If you like, you could put yourself in the shoes
of someone who works in the non-profit sector, is very bright, social by nature
and excited about using new tech to its best, but knows she doesn’t know much
about Twitter, so doesn’t want to jump in and do it blindly. You don’t have to
do that bit, but that’s who I was writing to. I’ve changed her name to Kelly
because I haven’t asked her if it’s okay to use her real name! (She's still in the field.)

5. I couldn't for the life of me think of a relavent picture for this that wasn't the Twitter bird again, so you're getting nice pictures of an old fun fare that was in London recently, just to break the text up. Yes, sorry, that horse called Stan is not a protagonist. The one further down called Chris, he's not either. They are decoys. I tried to embed a NASA video, but seems their site is glitchy, so we'll just have to see how that holds up. Sorry again. Everything else will be relevant, I promise

Okay, here you go:

Kelly,

So then. Twitter. I thought I could stick
some basic premise stuff down, a couple of tips to bear in mind as you get
started and then point you in the direction of a couple of blogs. Then we can
discuss at whatever length over sojutinis :) Please ignore if this is bullet-y,
I am just a bit tight on time at the moment. Anything doesn't make immediate
sense, too, then just holler! You are getting a first draft download from my
brain, so there may well be some odd bits!

Before I start, I'm working on the
assumption that you know how to follow, unfolow people, etc. Let me know if not
and I'll send some more thoughts.

The key thing about Twitter is
that it is a conversation.

So a good rule of thumb is to ask yourself
when you tweet if this is something you would say in conversation. I frequently
probably say weird things in conversation, so when I am tweeting a
lot, no doubt my tweet stream can get a bit quirky but that's just me, so it's
fine. The stuff you need to look out for, especially if you are some sort of
nfp are, for instance, asking for money/time/things before you've built a
relationship with anyone or expecting people to be interested just because
you're a nfp. On Twitter you have to earn your followers and earn their
respect. This is how you get your influence. When you have built your influence,
then you can ask for things. This is a pretty healthy reality check for anyone, I think.

The major risk, in my eyes, of being a not
for profit and not understanding twitter, is that you get very "push"
communication in your style - basically, you rely on pushing out the
information that you org wants to get to people, rather than using twitter to
find out what they want to hear about. BLANK ORG in the UK, for instance, used
to start most tweets with "REPORT:"

Problems with this?

1. Stop shouting at me. I was having a
nice day, why are you shouting at me?

2. Twitter is a really human forum, so
give me an opinion or tell me why I should read this first off, don't just tell
me you have a report

3. The BLANK ORG Twitter account hadn't
built a relationship with me that meant it could demand I do something and
goddamnit I have enough reports to read

4. It's repetition of something a bit crap
when they are using it all the time

5. Don't shout the word "report"
at me. It's not an enticing or sexy word now, is it, BLANK ORG?

6. Are you ever just going to say
"hello"? You don't care about me at ALL!

BLANK ORG didn't understand that twitter
was about interaction. (They are an interesting case study and I
should check back in with them to see how their twitter stream looks now, as I
unfollowed them pretty quickly!) Anyway, the opposite, in communications speak,
of push comms, is "pull" comms. So, those based around what people
actually want to know and what is importantly to them. A great place to start
before you actually start tweeting, could be to ask yourself what your org can
contribute to the twitter community - what are you trying to do as an org and
what do you offer? What help or advice are you able to share? What is your
positioning? i.e. Fundraising is heavy in my positioning, so I will share a
great piece of fundraising research if I have it, but I am also a massive geek,
so I was going wild on Twitter NASA were streaming footage from a rocket they
had swinging around the moon last year (a rocket around the moon!!!). These sorts of things also tell you that
I'm not just on Twitter because I want something from you.

Asks -

Don't ask for something before you have
people who trust you and before you've earnt the right to ask them for things.
This, again, you can moderate with the "would I say this in
conversation?" rule. i.e. Would you walk into my living room if you'd only
talked to me once on the bus and ask me for 50 bucks without really saying
hello? No, you would not. And, alternatively, I would think you were rude for
doing so and probably not want to talk to you again :) Like I said, this is a
good rule of thumb.

Read -

Before you really get tweeting, you should
READ. Mess about with with the search on twitter and look for things that you
are interested in or that might be relevant to you/what you do. Read what
people are saying, look at what people are hashtagging (this denotes
an area of interest, sometimes a conversation, sometimes something that the
author wants to make available for easy search by anyone else - an easy example
of this is #worldcup).

Conversations -

If you see a conversation that you want to
get involved in, then just chip in. This is how we make friends and learn
things. (Let me know if you don't know how to do this - I'm trying to remember
how much you'd used this before...) People may or may not answer depending on
the volume of tweeters involved in the chat, but keep chipping in or asking
questions. I generally make it a rule to answer EVERYTHING that people address
to me. It's good practice (think conversation, think common courtesy, etc.),
but I also do not have a crazy number followers, so the work load isn't heavy,
thus I can.

Your profile and who you are -

Fill out your profile (with avatar) so
people can see you if they want to know. Have a think about this and how much
or little you want to put in. Maybe have a look at other people and see what
you like about how they've described themselves. This and your recent tweets
will likely be what people use to decide whether to follow you or not. And you
should always have an actual person with a name, who is answerable for the
tweets - you can even do this if there are multiple people tweeting from one
account (ask me how if you might be doing this). This is both for authenticity
(we are leagues beyond the time where cut & paste answers are acceptable)
and it also give personality to your tweets. Your tweets should be a combo of
your work and you. Otherwise you are boring and no one will want to talk to
you. Kelly, however, is very interesting, and only maniacs wouldn't want to
speak to her.

Hashtags -

Let me know if you don't know how to use
these in searches, etc. They are very useful and great fun, too actually!

Regular conversations -

There are regular conversations that go on
on Twitter (using a hashtag reference to mark themselves) about all kinds of things.
A fun one is #LYTchat, which takes place on a Sunday night, I'm trying to
remember exactly when, but about 9pm EST. That's just a bunch of people
answering broad questions on how you organize your life and stay happy. I like
Elizabeth PW, the chick that runs it - ANYWAY, I throw that in because it's an
easy way to get a handle on how the regular conversations work, regardless of what the
topic is. Do a search for that hashtag at about that time on a Sunday night and
have a look. You can of course chip in whenever you like.

So, to sum up my tiny crash course intro
to twitter -

Your account should be a combination of
you and your org

Your authenticity will be what wins people
over

Don't be afraid to bring your sense of
humour. In fact, make sure you do.

On the whole, Twitter is a really warm,
enabling environment, so don't be afraid to just get started. There is the
occasional jackass on there, but they tend weed themselves out and stop
tweeting, because they aren't welcome

Please consider that to be Round One. I
really hope it's useful at least somewhat to get started with. Let me know what
you think and come back with questions if you have them! Look forward to
catching up non-virtually next month :)

Travel safe, take care,

a- x

That’s all folks. Except for to request that the lazy blog prize is vegan cake, if possible. Ta.

__________________________________

* As an experiment in self-discipline, I’ve
actually left the typos in, barring the one I stated (I had written “wold”
instead of “wild”), to see if I can be less precious about it. It’s making my
skin itch, but I’m kind of standing strong. I hope it doesn’t disrupt your
reading too much.

** As an ex-Frog of the Blue
variety, I feel totally compelled to add that I debated taking this out as I
think it verges on vomit-worthy sycophantic when you put it in a public forum.
I left it, as it is what I wrote and, well, what I think. Mark, if you pick this up, I’ll
write something nasty about you in a future blog to balance out, K?

Comments

An offline Twitter chat shared

This might win the prize for laziest blog
I’ve ever written. Are there prizes for that? I’m getting one if there are.

I got almost shockingly great feedback to my
Twitter and my drug habit post this week (THANK you to anyone who took the time) and at a similar time I got some great feedback from
a friend on a brain dump of an email that I’d done for her on how to get
started on Twitter. I thought I might just share the email straight, on the off
chance that it’s as useful to anyone else as it was to her.

Read on knowing the following things:

1. 1. This is, to all intents and
purposes, the exact email I sent – I’ve pretty much fixed one typo, pulled out names and added some hyperlinks, in case you get bored*

2. 2. It’s very colloquial - it is NOT a
professional thought piece. It is an on the fly, series of words written at circa
2am to catch my friend before she flew out to a project in the field. You'll get a tiny bit of overlap if you read the druggy blog, too

3. 3. It was written for someone with
little to no Twitter experience

4. 4. If you like, you could put yourself in the shoes
of someone who works in the non-profit sector, is very bright, social by nature
and excited about using new tech to its best, but knows she doesn’t know much
about Twitter, so doesn’t want to jump in and do it blindly. You don’t have to
do that bit, but that’s who I was writing to. I’ve changed her name to Kelly
because I haven’t asked her if it’s okay to use her real name! (She's still in the field.)

5. I couldn't for the life of me think of a relavent picture for this that wasn't the Twitter bird again, so you're getting nice pictures of an old fun fare that was in London recently, just to break the text up. Yes, sorry, that horse called Stan is not a protagonist. The one further down called Chris, he's not either. They are decoys. I tried to embed a NASA video, but seems their site is glitchy, so we'll just have to see how that holds up. Sorry again. Everything else will be relevant, I promise

Okay, here you go:

Kelly,

So then. Twitter. I thought I could stick
some basic premise stuff down, a couple of tips to bear in mind as you get
started and then point you in the direction of a couple of blogs. Then we can
discuss at whatever length over sojutinis :) Please ignore if this is bullet-y,
I am just a bit tight on time at the moment. Anything doesn't make immediate
sense, too, then just holler! You are getting a first draft download from my
brain, so there may well be some odd bits!

Before I start, I'm working on the
assumption that you know how to follow, unfolow people, etc. Let me know if not
and I'll send some more thoughts.

The key thing about Twitter is
that it is a conversation.

So a good rule of thumb is to ask yourself
when you tweet if this is something you would say in conversation. I frequently
probably say weird things in conversation, so when I am tweeting a
lot, no doubt my tweet stream can get a bit quirky but that's just me, so it's
fine. The stuff you need to look out for, especially if you are some sort of
nfp are, for instance, asking for money/time/things before you've built a
relationship with anyone or expecting people to be interested just because
you're a nfp. On Twitter you have to earn your followers and earn their
respect. This is how you get your influence. When you have built your influence,
then you can ask for things. This is a pretty healthy reality check for anyone, I think.

The major risk, in my eyes, of being a not
for profit and not understanding twitter, is that you get very "push"
communication in your style - basically, you rely on pushing out the
information that you org wants to get to people, rather than using twitter to
find out what they want to hear about. BLANK ORG in the UK, for instance, used
to start most tweets with "REPORT:"

Problems with this?

1. Stop shouting at me. I was having a
nice day, why are you shouting at me?

2. Twitter is a really human forum, so
give me an opinion or tell me why I should read this first off, don't just tell
me you have a report

3. The BLANK ORG Twitter account hadn't
built a relationship with me that meant it could demand I do something and
goddamnit I have enough reports to read

4. It's repetition of something a bit crap
when they are using it all the time

5. Don't shout the word "report"
at me. It's not an enticing or sexy word now, is it, BLANK ORG?

6. Are you ever just going to say
"hello"? You don't care about me at ALL!

BLANK ORG didn't understand that twitter
was about interaction. (They are an interesting case study and I
should check back in with them to see how their twitter stream looks now, as I
unfollowed them pretty quickly!) Anyway, the opposite, in communications speak,
of push comms, is "pull" comms. So, those based around what people
actually want to know and what is importantly to them. A great place to start
before you actually start tweeting, could be to ask yourself what your org can
contribute to the twitter community - what are you trying to do as an org and
what do you offer? What help or advice are you able to share? What is your
positioning? i.e. Fundraising is heavy in my positioning, so I will share a
great piece of fundraising research if I have it, but I am also a massive geek,
so I was going wild on Twitter NASA were streaming footage from a rocket they
had swinging around the moon last year (a rocket around the moon!!!). These sorts of things also tell you that
I'm not just on Twitter because I want something from you.

Asks -

Don't ask for something before you have
people who trust you and before you've earnt the right to ask them for things.
This, again, you can moderate with the "would I say this in
conversation?" rule. i.e. Would you walk into my living room if you'd only
talked to me once on the bus and ask me for 50 bucks without really saying
hello? No, you would not. And, alternatively, I would think you were rude for
doing so and probably not want to talk to you again :) Like I said, this is a
good rule of thumb.

Read -

Before you really get tweeting, you should
READ. Mess about with with the search on twitter and look for things that you
are interested in or that might be relevant to you/what you do. Read what
people are saying, look at what people are hashtagging (this denotes
an area of interest, sometimes a conversation, sometimes something that the
author wants to make available for easy search by anyone else - an easy example
of this is #worldcup).

Conversations -

If you see a conversation that you want to
get involved in, then just chip in. This is how we make friends and learn
things. (Let me know if you don't know how to do this - I'm trying to remember
how much you'd used this before...) People may or may not answer depending on
the volume of tweeters involved in the chat, but keep chipping in or asking
questions. I generally make it a rule to answer EVERYTHING that people address
to me. It's good practice (think conversation, think common courtesy, etc.),
but I also do not have a crazy number followers, so the work load isn't heavy,
thus I can.

Your profile and who you are -

Fill out your profile (with avatar) so
people can see you if they want to know. Have a think about this and how much
or little you want to put in. Maybe have a look at other people and see what
you like about how they've described themselves. This and your recent tweets
will likely be what people use to decide whether to follow you or not. And you
should always have an actual person with a name, who is answerable for the
tweets - you can even do this if there are multiple people tweeting from one
account (ask me how if you might be doing this). This is both for authenticity
(we are leagues beyond the time where cut & paste answers are acceptable)
and it also give personality to your tweets. Your tweets should be a combo of
your work and you. Otherwise you are boring and no one will want to talk to
you. Kelly, however, is very interesting, and only maniacs wouldn't want to
speak to her.

Hashtags -

Let me know if you don't know how to use
these in searches, etc. They are very useful and great fun, too actually!

Regular conversations -

There are regular conversations that go on
on Twitter (using a hashtag reference to mark themselves) about all kinds of things.
A fun one is #LYTchat, which takes place on a Sunday night, I'm trying to
remember exactly when, but about 9pm EST. That's just a bunch of people
answering broad questions on how you organize your life and stay happy. I like
Elizabeth PW, the chick that runs it - ANYWAY, I throw that in because it's an
easy way to get a handle on how the regular conversations work, regardless of what the
topic is. Do a search for that hashtag at about that time on a Sunday night and
have a look. You can of course chip in whenever you like.

So, to sum up my tiny crash course intro
to twitter -

Your account should be a combination of
you and your org

Your authenticity will be what wins people
over

Don't be afraid to bring your sense of
humour. In fact, make sure you do.

On the whole, Twitter is a really warm,
enabling environment, so don't be afraid to just get started. There is the
occasional jackass on there, but they tend weed themselves out and stop
tweeting, because they aren't welcome

Please consider that to be Round One. I
really hope it's useful at least somewhat to get started with. Let me know what
you think and come back with questions if you have them! Look forward to
catching up non-virtually next month :)

Travel safe, take care,

a- x

That’s all folks. Except for to request that the lazy blog prize is vegan cake, if possible. Ta.

__________________________________

* As an experiment in self-discipline, I’ve
actually left the typos in, barring the one I stated (I had written “wold”
instead of “wild”), to see if I can be less precious about it. It’s making my
skin itch, but I’m kind of standing strong. I hope it doesn’t disrupt your
reading too much.

** As an ex-Frog of the Blue
variety, I feel totally compelled to add that I debated taking this out as I
think it verges on vomit-worthy sycophantic when you put it in a public forum.
I left it, as it is what I wrote and, well, what I think. Mark, if you pick this up, I’ll
write something nasty about you in a future blog to balance out, K?